Original Sin - The Board Game funded!

HiddenX

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Divinity Original Sin the Board Game has been funded on Kickstarter:

That was quite a rush!



It took over a year to develop the first prototype and make it to this point, and thanks to you, only four hours to reach our funding goal. But this is just the beginning... well... the middle.

We can't thank you enough for the adrenaline you've thrown our way today, and we've spent the day trying to keep up with the velocity of the campaign and what comes next. We have 29 days to cover, and we hear you loud and clear: you're into it!

So are we. And so with that said, we've cooked up a few stretch goals. To tide us all over.

Beast and Lohse, two of Divinity: Original SIn 2's characters make their way to the game, joining Ifan, Vali, Farzanah, and the infamous Red Prince. Along with these friends comes upgrades for the Summoners of you, featuring two high quality minis, the Incarnate and the Bone Widow.

The good thing about these Stretch goals is that if we reach them, everyone will benefit from them because all stretch goal content is automatically added to your boxes.

[...]
More information.
 
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The question is to know what this product adds.


It seems Larian has been surprised by the speed of funding.

KS projects and likes stage their surprise. The funded in ten seconds is a huge magnet selling a product as the thing of the moment. Part of the commercial approach.

160 K$ funding goal, pledge at $160, only 1000 pledgers and it is cool. Discounting that people are now used to the stretch goal game: they pledge to see, if they do not like it, they withdraw.
 
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To eventual backers:

The Kickstarter track record of this game's designer (Lynnvander) is abysmal. There are undelivered games from 2014 that were designed by this company. A lot of kickstarters by them were not fulfilled yet (long past deadline) and are full of complaints.

If I were to back this super expensive, albeit lacking in production game, I would buckle up and prepare for years of waiting.
 
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It is quite common for crowdfunded projects to be behind schedule, especially when they organize multiple waves.

The way crowdfunding works.
 
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To eventual backers:

The Kickstarter track record of this game's designer (Lynnvander) is abysmal. There are undelivered games from 2014 that were designed by this company. A lot of kickstarters by them were not fulfilled yet (long past deadline) and are full of complaints.

If I were to back this super expensive, albeit lacking in production game, I would buckle up and prepare for years of waiting.
Except it is not a kickstarter of Lynnvander. It is Larian's kickstarter. There are many avid board players in Larian and as far as I know they are working with Lynnvander as they are more knowledgeable in making a board game.
 
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Board game kickstarters are very different than computer game kickstarters. There is no long process of programming the engine and designing the graphics. The rules and majority of the game system are usually full designed before they ever reach kickstarter (though there may be a heavy playtesting period to come). So they are generally a lot safer to back because there are many fewer things that can go wrong. Some people even make money off of it because hot board games often run out of physical copies and can be resold for much more than the backing price. Often if you don't back the game it's impossible to get a copy without paying 2-3 times as much on ebay.

Anyway board games are a huge deal right now so it makes sense that they would try something like that. I'd consider backing it but I've already backed 3 major cooperative board games I'm waiting on and there are only so many my group can realistically find time to play.
 
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I think you guys don't get it.

I have participated in a huge number of board game kickstarters and I kind of see where this one is going. Famous ip, high cost of entry with relatively low content to offer in the base game and a great number of meaningless add ons to inflate costs. Oh, no shipping price is shown, so who knows what the final price will be.

That looks exactly like a CMON (Zombicide, Rising Sun) kickstarter, except it's not CMON, but an unknown, extremely unreliable designer this time. Lynnvander has a terrible track record, and I can get Larian trying to enter the board gaming world as it's so hot right now, but what is clear here is that they did not do their research well as to whom to choose as designers.

They could have chosen Monolith, CMON, Awaken Realms, Stonemaier, Phalanx, Cephalofair, Succubus, or many other excellent designers in the business, but instead they have chosen an unknown, untested and highly contested company to do it.

A simple visit to this company's kickstarters' comment section will show what this is all about.

To make matters worse, the game doesn't even look good and is extremely expensive for what it provides. There are a lot of better options available right now, such as Gloomhaven and Middara.

I just wish those who are thinking about backing this a whole lot of luck and patience. And serenity when they're 2 or 3 years late with fulfillment.

I recommend those interested to take a look at this game's forum at boardgamegeek.com. The comments there might be informative.
 
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Building on fadedc's comments, you can really think of board game Kickstarters as essentially pre-orders these days. Little risk beyond how good the final game might be (as typically there aren't actual reviews out yet).

Just my two cents as a board game player and designer, overall this looks too fiddly for my tastes. There are a lot of cool coop fantasy games being released these days and while the Divinity IP is going to help this be a big Kickstarter success, I'm not certain the gameplay will be as nearly as good as some other recent and upcoming releases in this area.

I kickstart a lot of boardgames and I love the Divinity video games but I won't be kickstarting this... I think it'll be a "meh" game.
 
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What other board games has Lynnvander done?

Compared to the really successful board games it's only raised a relatively small amount on it's first day. There isn't really all that much initial buzz about it within the board game community either. I guess there are so many promising (and not so promising) co-op massive campaign games coming out that it's hard to make a splash without some really good word of mouth. I think Middara lost money on it's first kickstarter and only started to be successful on the second one, due to word of mouth from actually playing the game. I'm looking forward to trying that one out in May.
 
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The problem is that while Middara's reputation is great (Succubus Publishing), Lynnvander's is awful. I will paste a BGG user (credit: Thomas M) with Lynnvander's history:
--

Lynnvander appears to have never had more than 450 backers on an individual compaign and appears to have never raised more than $60K CA on a single campaign.
Struggling to understand why Larian would have chosen this company for their board game.

Note: The BGG page also lists Lynnvander as the Publisher for the Divinity Originial Sin Board Game, not Larian.

Lynnvander Kickstarter History:
https://www.kickstarter.com/discover/advanced?category_id=34

Note: Left out Legacy of Mana since it lists Norse Foundry.

Albion's Legacy 2E (437 backers for $46K CA)
Last Update: December 21, 2018
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/albions-lega
Appears to have mostly fulfilled
Comments:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/albions-lega

Gascony's Legacy (228 backers for $29K CA)
BGG Rating: 5.5
Last Update: August 10, 2019
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/gasconys-leg
Comments (Not Great):
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/gasconys-leg

Deep 5.h1t (159 backers for $17K CA)
BGG Rating: 5.4
Last Update: August 7, 2018
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/deep-5h1t/po
Comments (not great):
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/deep-5h1t/co

Neverland's Legacy (258 backers for $42K CA)
BGG Rating: 7.3
Last Update: February 1, 2019
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/neverlands-l
Comments:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/neverlands-l
Unclear whether 2nd wave was delivered

Albion's Legacy (425 backers for $39k CA)
BGG Rating: 6.9 (Expansions: 6.4 and 6.1)
Last Update: June 1, 2018
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/albions-lega
Comments (not great):
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/albions-lega

Legacy Line Board Game Collection (99 backers for $17K CA)
Last Update: April 22, 2019
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/the-legacy-l
Appears to have mostly fulfilled
Comments:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/the-legacy-l

Legacy Series Metal Miniatures (52 backers for $5K CA)
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/the-legacy-s
Appears to have fulfilled

Sherwood's Legacy (306 backers for $60K CA)
BGG Rating: 7.0
Last Update: February 1, 2019
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/sherwoods-le
Comments:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/lynnvander/sherwoods-le

UPDATE:
A search on BGG also shows the following games that Lynnvander Studios did work on:
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgameexpansion/230531/buffy-va
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/230528/cowboy-bebop-boar
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/235807/reanimator
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/66947/galaxy-quest
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/257445/super-camelot
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/287507/evil-dead-2-board
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/185988/cyberrun
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgameexpansion/281949/shadowru
 
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Nice digging there, I won't look as I won't back this one either way but always nice to see information provided.

I think this game will be great fun but I neither have physical players nor really space for the game itself. I struggle just to have an open spot for my Fane statue as is.

If I wasn't in need of saving money I might just have backed it just for the assumed update videos. :lol:
 
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They could have chosen Monolith, CMON, Awaken Realms, Stonemaier, Phalanx, Cephalofair, Succubus, or many other excellent designers in the business, but instead they have chosen an unknown, untested and highly contested company to do it.

They are overbooked. Beside, they also feature behind the schedule troubles.

AR is already teasing their next project while having like three projects hanging.



Building on fadedc's comments, you can really think of board game Kickstarters as essentially pre-orders these days. Little risk beyond how good the final game might be (as typically there aren't actual reviews out yet).
.

Nothing like an essential risk when buying a game.

Board game kickstarters are very different than computer game kickstarters.
Indeed. There is no second market to install a speculation trend.
There is no long process of programming the engine and designing the graphics. The rules and majority of the game system are usually full designed before they ever reach kickstarter (though there may be a heavy playtesting period to come). So they are generally a lot safer to back because there are many fewer things that can go wrong.
Usually, they provide a prototype. Nothing like a full design kind of things. There can be a huge reworking in game mechanics and pledge goals attached to the project because there is a demand for it not because designers think they can properly deliver on them.

Some people even make money off of it because hot board games often run out of physical copies and can be resold for much more than the backing price. Often if you don't back the game it's impossible to get a copy without paying 2-3 times as much on ebay.


Indeed, the crowdfunding movement has set the stage for speculation.
It used to be very straightforward to get someone else to pay for your consumption habits: placing two pledges and reselling one at a price that could mean recouping all of it. For once, an investment.

A full bag of tricks to capture customers: exclusive releases,postponed localizations, no releases through an alternate circuit etc

Not only people pay before anything solid is known about the product essential dimension of being a game (introducing a bias in reviewing the product by the way), not only they bank on speculation with people overbuying, it also allows to avoid bomb reviewing.

Board games are no strangers to the process, they get bombed anytime players do not like a feature, players who do not even own the product.
Players feel endangered by the existence of a feature in a product so they try to ruin it.
 
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Interesting about Lynnvander. It's hard to know how big a deal they are given that Larian appears to be the main developer, but it's still a questionable choice to partner with them. If the game looked really promising I'm not sure it would be enough to discourage me though.

The problem is that while the game has some interesting ideas, there's so little information about it. No copies of the first chapter sent to reviewers, no PDF of the rulebook, not even a really deep explanation of how the game will work. I'm currently backing Middara, Oathsworn and Aeon:Tresspass, and for all of these games I knew pretty much what I was getting into. I'd read the rules, watched videos of gameplay, etc. But for this there is nothing.

The 2020 release date seems highly questionable too unless it's much further along in development than it appears. Oathsworn and Aeon:Tresspass are much more fully developed and I'm not expecting either game until 2021.
 
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Thanks for the head's up, @arthureloi;. I was contemplating backing it -- well actually, if not for the rather steep entry price I might have backed instantly -- but I think I will hold off for now.

Any good fantasy, coop board games you can recommend?
 
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Any good fantasy, coop board games you can recommend?

If you want a long drawn out campaign that you play over months of time and which feels like an epic D&D campaign then Gloomhaven is pretty much the go to game right now. It's also one of the few that you can just go to a store and buy. It is a very heavy/complex game though and because of that not everyone will enjoy it. Descent is kind of a much simpler/earlier version of Gloomhaven, but it requires an app to play fully co-op.

There are lots of other games out there depending on what type of game your looking for. There are more casual games, and non-campaign games that are played over a single session, and plenty of games that are trying to be the next Gloomhaven killer but which aren't out.
 
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Thanks for the head's up, @arthureloi;. I was contemplating backing it -- well actually, if not for the rather steep entry price I might have backed instantly -- but I think I will hold off for now.

Any good fantasy, coop board games you can recommend?

No problem!

The best one out right now is Gloomhaven. There is no contender, not even close. The campaign is very extensive (90+ quests), the lore is novel and awesome, and the diceless combat makes things extremely strategic and interesting. It's the closest you can get to RPG in a box.

There is one expansion released and two in development.

Then you have Middara. If you like JRPGs, it's Final Fantasy in a box (with a whole lot of story reading between quests). Also, you use dice in combat.

Gloomhaven and Middara are the kings of RPG board gaming these days. I highly recommend both, with the caveat that, whereas Gloomhaven is your much more classical affair, Middara is at its best when players enjoy JRPGs and reading a lot.

If you're into light ARPGs, don't care about story and like zombie themed games, I really recommend Zombicide (Black Plague, Green Horde and Invader). I love it, I started painting miniatures because of it.

Finally, if you like it dark, hardcore, gritty, graphical, and wouldn't mind town building to go along for it, I really recommend Kingdom Death Monster. The title says it all. You and your pals will develop a kingdom, die a lot and hunt monsters, possibly losing your characters' limbs, sanity and morale in the process, but generating their children, bringing materials for building and crafting and developing the town until the next tragedy or monster comes knocking on your door. This one is just about to get huge black friday discounts.

I can't recommend one of these over another as I love them all and they appeal to different tastes, but I would definitely start with Gloomhaven if I had to choose only one. Just too much content in one box!

I am willing to bet big money that any of these are leagues ahead of this Divinity board game!
 
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The big caveat for Middara is that you can't actually buy it right now....except maybe on the secondary market. Even then you might want to wait for the 1.1 rules change to play. I'm not sure if the second wave is still taking orders or not, that's coming in May, and what I am waiting for. Anyway I haven't actually played Middara but it looks very promising and it also seems like it's a little less complex so more casual players might not be as turned off by it as they would by Gloomhaven.

Kingdom Death Monster I'd really like to try, but the $400 price tag is a bit much. Haven't heard about this black Friday sale though.

It's not fantasy, but I'm personally having a lot of fun with Arkham Horror the Living Card Game. It does an amazing job of story telling and having interesting characters and mechanics, although you do have to buy a fair amount of stuff for it. Gloomhaven is still the best though.
 
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